Overnight Stuffed French Toast – and Why I’m A Morning Person

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I’m going to be bringing you a recipe that isn’t a sweet soon, but I wanted to have this delicious recipe to you before Valentine’s day in case you’d like to make it for your sweetie’s breakfast. Assemble everything the night before and then just pop it in the oven in the morning and breakfast is served!

Before I go into the recipe you know I have to chat though! Yesterday evening while I was making supper I got a phone call from my friend, Tim (or Teeeyuhm as is the proper Slabama pronunciation). Tim and I have known each other for several years and lately we’ve been working on our first project together, a Southern lifestyle radio show that we’ll be distributing through several channels (including the internet, so anyone reading this will be able to download it and listen free). I’ve spoke about it briefly on the Front Porch and got some great input from y’all there! We filmed our first few shows two weeks ago but then never put them out there once we got them produced because – dun Dun DUN!

Some friends of ours who are Dj’s listened to them and liked us (there’s just no accounting for taste these days ya know) and invited us to come record our show live in their studio. Out of this we’ve also managed to get advertisers and a producer, which is pretty dern cool for not having a single show air yet! So that is where I’ll be this Saturday morning, recording and likely feeding people in a radio studio. This time around you should hear the final product hopefully within a week.
Oh wait, I had a point…

So Tim was acting as a go between to set up a time that we would be there to record. I asked him if we could do it in the morning since that is a special day for me and I wanted to spend the bigger part of it with the kids.

He said “Oh sure, the morning works best for me, too. So you wanna meet say around ten?”

I laughed at him. You know, because I’m just that kind of friend.

“Tim, 10 o clock is not morning. 10 o clock is practically lunchtime”

Tim spoke in his defense that he wakes up at 6:00 AM each morning but he can’t be creative until at least ten. After I explained to him that my grandmother refers to his getting up at 6:00 AM as “just a laying up in the bed until six” I finally managed to talk him down to 9:00. Now my goal is to eventually shame him into 8:00 a.m. ~giggle~

Yeah, I’m definitely a morning person. I have a multitude of reasons for this BUTIt’s not that I’m better than anyone else, therefore I rise in the morning…ANDIt’s not that I don’t like sleep (sleep and I have a very committed relationship)…ANDIt’s not that I want to one up everyone else with my wakeup time or that I really and truly have to start work at 4:00 AM.

The truth of the matter is I’m a major construction project so I’ve got to get to work early. No, I don’t mean makeup and hair, although that takes a good bit of work as well. I mean Me, as a person, myself, I’m under some serious construction. In order to be a better person, to live up to whatever meager potential that has been placed within me – I’ve got some serious work to do so I gotta get going on it early.

Being a positive person? That takes work. Making sure I have a filter in place so I don’t say everything I want to say? That takes some serious work (and sometimes i have to sit on my hands so they won’t type!). Having my head in the right place so I don’t even think ugly things to begin with? Better make sure we have a full crew present on site each day by 5:00 am at the latest.

Loving others? Okay, that comes easy. It’s so very easy to love other people and I’ll admit that part comes naturally for me. But being the kind of person I was meant to be? Disciplining myself on a day to day basis to fill the shoes that were placed before me? – that takes some work. So I gotta start early.
Coffee anyone?

11111

You’ll need: Eggs, Strawberry Preserves*, Cream Cheese, Vanilla (not the gallon I have pictured here, just a little bit will do), Milk, and a loaf of French Bread.

*If you aren’t crazy about strawberry preserves just get your favorite, but this sho nuff is some good stuff with the strawberry in there!

Make sure your cream cheese is good and soft and place it in a mixing bowl with about 3 Tablespoons of preserves.

Mix that up with your electric mixer until good and blended.

Like this.

Now take your loaf of bread and cut some big old honking slices out of it.

We want our slices to be anywhere from an inch and a half to two inches thick.

Using a knife, cut a little pocket into each one, making sure you don’t cut all the way through to the bottom or all the way through to the sides. We just want a little pocket in the very center that we can stuff our cream cheese mixture into.

Oh, by the way, you can totally use fat fee or low fat cream cheese or that other thing folks use in place of cream cheese called neufetchel or something like that.

You can also use sugar free preserves if you want. It’s a free country 🙂

Here are our slices all stuffed and ready to go.

Spray a 9×13 baking dish with cooking spray.

This is a deeper than normal baking dish but you can use a regular one if you like, it will be just fine.

Place them all on their sides in the baking dish.

Mix your other ingredients really well.

I just use a fork to do this with..

Slowly pour liquid over bread slices. I pour a little over the top of each one until I run out.

Cover and place in the refrigerator overnight.

Sometimes I make this as a special treat as part of our supper and then I just assemble in the morning and let sit in the fridge, covered, all day.

When ready to bake, remove cover and bake at 350 for 30-40 minutes, or until golden.

At this point my assistant food stylist had set the plate out and arranged some strawberries for me and said “Here, get a picture of me so they know I helped”

Here she is, in her rhinestone tiara. We had just got back from going out shopping together and she wore the tiara the entire time.

I asked her, before leaving, if she thought she should take it off or wear it and she said “Oh Mama, it’s just the same thing as a headband, only sparklier!”.

I’ll be danged if that isn’t a smart kid!

And here is the lovely final photograph she helped arrange!

To prepare your strawberry syrup, simply take some strawberry preserves and place them in a microwave safe cup or small pitcher and follow the instructions in the recipe below. This makes a delicious and super easy syrup!

I dearly love any time I get to hear from you but I especially enjoy the comments here on Southern Plate because I get to save them here and I have a much better chance of getting to write back to you.

Are you a construction project, too? Do you think you’re going to make this french toast soon? What is the best part of each morning for you? I’d love for you to answer any of these questions or just drop a “Hidy” in the comments below!

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~The Wolf Within~

An old Grandfather, whose grandson came to him with anger at a schoolmate who had done him an injustice, said, “Let me tell you a story. I too, at times, have felt a great hate for those that have taken so much, with no sorrow for what they do. But hate wears you down, and does not hurt your enemy. It is like taking poison and wishing your enemy would die. I have struggled with these feelings many times.”

He continued, “It is as if there are two wolves inside me; one is good and does no harm. He lives in harmony with all around him and does not take offense when no offense was intended. He will only fight when it is right to do so, and in the right way.”

“But the other wolf, ah! He is full of anger. The littlest thing will set him into a fit of temper. He fights everyone, all the time, for no reason. He cannot think because his anger and hate are so great. It is hard to live with these two wolves inside me, for both of them try to dominate my spirit.”

The boy looked intently into his Grandfather’s eyes and asked, “Which one wins, Grandfather?”

The Grandfather solemnly said, “The one I feed.”

A Native American tale told many times around the Sacred Fire.Author Unknown

Oh thank you so much for this recipe!!! This will be our Easter breakfast this year! I love night before breakfast casseroles and even share two of my faves with a friend yesterday. I will share this one with her today!! (and pin for the future!)

I prepared it tonight and will bake it in the morning. I hope it turns out good. It looks just like the pictures. I appreciate you posting pictures so you know you are doing it right. Thanks for the recipe.

Got this recipe soaking in the fridge now and going to give it four hours then bake it for my wife for Mothers Day breakfast and make the doughnuts, or donuts whichever way one prefers to spell it. Y’all can check out some of my music at the website I left give me a shout if you’d like. Thanks for all the recipes I try them all the time and they are fantastic. I’m a guy but love to cook because I love to eat and grew up in the kitchen with my Granny. Remember don’t trust no skinny cooks 😉

I just wanted to say thank you for sharing all your delicious recipes! I LOVE to cook, especially things from scratch. As of February of this year, meals became a challenge due to my changing tastes! (I’m pregnant with our 2nd baby. 🙂 My aunt forwarded me an email from southernplate.com, and I’ve been hooked ever since! The first thing I ever tried was Meme’s Mashed Potatoes. I’ve ALWAYS made mine from scratch, but oh my gosh does the evaporated milk make a HUGE flavor difference. Our 2 yr old son gobbled them up!
I have made several of your recipes and enjoyed them all.
Most recently, I made the buttermilk lime pound cake for my mother’s day as well as prepared the overnight stuffed french toast. I loved both, and shared a lot of the cake. I have the french toast in the fridge now for a second time. This time I added some strawberry extract in the place of the vanilla. If I have time I’ll make a syrup with some fresh strawberries. I always appreciate make ahead breakfast recipes since we have an early bird child who is always hungry.

Oh and my husband and son love the stuffed pizza sticks, and they’re so EASY! Are all of your online recipes in your new cook book? I may ask my husband to buy it for me.

Oh my goodness, thank you so much Michelle!! I am so glad to hear that you are enjoying the recipes! There are recipes in the cookbook that are exclusive to the cookbook, although there are a few in the cookbook that are on the website. My new cookbook will be on shelves this fall and it is the same, there are a few recipes that will be on the website but most will be exclusive to the cookbook.

This recipe sounds yummy. Another fruit to consider is raspberries. There is a restaurant nearby that serves stuffed french toast, and they add pecans to the cream cheese mixture and make a puree of raspberries to pour over the top. Yummy!

I’m making these now and will have for dinner tonight. I used the two end pieces to test the strawberry/cream cheese mixture….had to make sure I got it right! And I did! Thanks for this recipe and for brightening my day with your wonderful stories!

HELP! I just bought a gallon of fresh strawberries that I would like to use. What do I do to them to make them suitable for this recipe? I’m diabetic so I’ll be using a blend of regular sugar and Splenda for the sweetening.

I’m embarrassed to even have to ask. I have lived in Huntsville my entire life. and I learned to cook at the knees of my grandmother and mother. You’d think I’d know these things. BTW, do you have an estimated date for when your next book will be available?

You’re fine and I’m glad to help! Here is what I would do. Now, I haven’t done this but this is what I would do… Wash and slice one cup of strawberries (one cup after they are sliced). Mix those with about 3 tablespoons of splenda and then mix that all together in a mixer with your softened cream cheese. It will pulverize those strawberries but it’ll be good. Use that to stuff your french toast.
When it comes to your syrup, there are a LOT of sugar free strawberry jams and preserves that would be wonderful in this recipe (see my recipe for how I make it into a syrup) or you could just use your favorite sugar free maple flavored syrup. Hope this helps!

I noticed you used Stonyfield Organic Whole Milk in this recipe. I just thought I’d mention that my cousin started that company many years ago when he lived in New Hampshire. He’s now happily retired and living in Maine. My family has enjoyed Stonyfield products throughout the years, especially their yogurt. When my kids were little, the company had a program where you can adopt a cow and they’d get pictures and reports of how “their” cow was doing. My kids are now adults, so I don’t know if this program still exists.

Christy, I’ve been following your blog for quit a while and have all your cookbooks; and just want to say THANK YOU for all the time and love you put into your endeavors.

Have just finished watching your video. You are so right about harbouring bad feelings etc.
I am letting go of all the negative things in my life and for the time I have left of this earth I shall be trying to make a difference for the better. You are an inspiration to bring out the good in people.
Glad you are enjoying your “time out” and keep up the wonderful work.
Shall be trying your Stuffed French Toast. Never had this before but it sounds tasty.
Thank you, Deirdre